A "WebOS" isn't that complex. Essentially, there are three main parts to the system:
-zridling
Not too complex compared to XP or Vista, but you still need (at least) {storage,video,network,sound,input-device} drivers, a TCP/IP stack, and enough of a standard code library to facilitate writing at least a GUI and a browser. This is a
lot of work, and writing a standards-compliant browser that can handle enough javascript, CSS, XHTML etc to run web applications is probably as complex a task as the rest of the system.
* A local web server to handle the data delivery and content display from the local machine to the browser. This local server will likely be highly optimized for its task, but would be capable of running locally installed web apps (e.g. a local copy of Gmail and all its associated data).
-zridling
Ummm, isn't the point of web apps that they generally run server-side, with very little client code? (except of course for some AJAX to not generate TOO much traffic and be too unresponsive)? Running the apps "locally" this way sounds pretty zany to me, and would suddenly require even more code in the "web os", to get perl/python/ruby/whatever running... not to mention that the web server can't be *too* simple (though lighthttpd will probably suffice).
In turn, for application developers, the great advantage is that instead of writing two or more programs for multiple platforms (one for the Web, one for Windows, etc.), they can write one app that will run on any machine (or phone!) with the WebOS using the same code base.
-zridling
We heard this for JAVA, we're hearing it for dotNET... I wouldn't be surprised if somebody even touted this for C/C++ back in the days.
fodder - as for first person shooters, if that were the case then HALO would not be a hit like it is. The latency in HALO and is low enough many people play them now across the internet on severs dedicated to this, just like WoW. Sure it bothers some, but they just don't play. Further, most FPS gamers I know hate the AI, and so won't play unless it is multiplayer, which pretty much means across the internet for many or most of them. I don't see that being any different in an Internet Only computer system.
-steeladept
Well, imagine the latency if all the rendering has to be done server-side, and sent back to the client... even with ubiqutous bandwidth, it just doesn't make sense moving everything serverside.
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